In the year that marks the centenary of Patrick Ambrose Treacy's death comes a book that captures the character of the man who did so much for private sector education for the Catholic Church throughout Australia.
An 'enterprising immigrant' is how the author Regis Hickey describes the Christian Brother. Born in Ireland in 1834, Patrick Ambrose Treacy spent his formative years in Thurles, Tipperary, at the Christian Brothers' school, later entering the Brothers' novitiate in Waterford. In August 1868 he departed Dublin, arriving in Melbourne, Australia, in November.
Ambrose arrived when free, secular and compulsory education was being introduced. He accepted the challenge of providing a quality Catholic education and would continue to address it for the next 30 years. This involved providing teachers, raising finance and erecting buildings without government assistance.
The book covers his strategies for successfully implementing his courageous ideas, including his fundraising journeys to goldfields in remote areas that are the stuff of legend, and details his relationships within the hierarchy of the church and the wider community.
In 1900, Ambrose returned to Dublin as assistant to the superior general of the institute. A decade later, her returned to Australia, where he died on Wednesday 2 October 1912.
